DELOREAN TRIAL JURORS TELL WHY THEY VOTED TO ACQUIT

UPI

Published: December 10, 1984

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 9—
Jurors who acquitted John Z. DeLorean of drug conspiracy charges said in a series of interviews published today that they did not mean their verdict to be a message in opposition to Government undercover operations.

Jurors interviewed by The American Lawyer and The Los Angeles Times said the public should not view the acquittal last Aug. 16 as an indictment against the practice of having law-enforcement officials pose as dishonest people and pretend to take part in criminal conspiracies.

Why the jury decided to acquit Mr. DeLorean, and other factors surrounding the verdict, were given for the first time in an article written by Steven Brill for the December issue of The American Lawyer and provided to The Times.

The magazine article, based on Mr. Brill's interviews with the jurors, was augmented by the newspaper's interviews with 10 of the 12 regular jurors. The Times reported the interviews disclosed that some jurors believed Mr. DeLorean, a former automobile maker, was morally culpable; the Government's case faltered with its first witness, and the Government's star witness, James Hoffman, the informer who played a pivotal role in Mr. DeLorean's arrest, was a disaster for the prosecution. Case Faltered Early

Mr. Brill said at least three jurors, Clarence Berman, Nancy Andersen and Jo Ann Kerns, felt strongly after hearing the first witness that Mr. DeLorean was not guilty. That witness was Benedict Tisa, a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent.

Mr. Tisa, who had posed as a dishonest banker in the case, seldom directly answered questions put to him in by the chief defense attorney, Howard L. Weitzman, in 12 days on the stand, and the agent amended his testimony almost daily. It was Mr. Weitzman who told reporters after the verdict that the jurors had asked him to relay a message that ''we don't tolerate the type of conduct the Government was involved in this particular case.''

But Harry Graves, another juror, said: ''I never considered sending a message to anyone. I don't think any honest citizen is going to get caught up in this. I did not think Mr. DeLorean was very honest, but I think he got sucked into it. A lot of us hated to see him walk.''

And the jury foreman, W. Vern Lahr, said: ''I had no message to deliver to anybody. My job was to look closely at the evidence. I did nothing more than that.''